15th of Tammuz

I decided I'll try something a little different with my books. I'm taking 3 of the ebook versions out of Amazon's Select program. It's a program only for the ebooks that helps promote them. You get 2 different promo 'tools' to use on them for each 3-month term. It also puts them in their 'library', which people can borrow and with each page read the author gets something from it. (Not much, though.) They also suggest them more. The thing is...if you enroll them in that it has to be exclusive to Amazon. You can't have it at any other retailer. It cuts the audience down. I also don't think it's working much. Although, I think they're keeping me from seeing how much I'm selling because I haven't switched to direct deposit into a bank account. It's set to checks, but they don't use checks in the US anymore. I probably should change that soon to make sure. 

Anyways, those 3 will be: Alliance, Alliance: Dawn, and Sweet Endless Terror. They're the oldest. I'm keeping them on Amazon (just not with Select). Both versions will be there. I'll publish them to Smashwords. They'll most likely be approved for their Premium Catalog, so it can be distributed to a lot of other retailers. Retailers like Apple, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, etc. They have a lot more than when I published last through them. They also will promote a series more. I'll have both the first book and sequel to Alliance on there this way. That'll help. Some retailers have higher royalties, too. I can't put them up on Smashwords until their terms are up. That'll be in August. 

I'll keep the memoir and cookbook in Select for now. When I'm done with Alliance 3 and it's published, I'll take the memoir off of Select. Eventually, that'll go to Smashwords, too. I think with every new book, I'll take an old one off of Select and publish it to Smashwords as well. It could be a nice little system this way. I could still use Amazon's promo tools this way. I could technically only do this after writing so many books. I'm going to take advantage of them. I just have to keep track of what's in Select and how long their terms are. 

Wrote more of Alliance 3 today. I would have gotten more done, but I was blanking a lot. The weird thing is I have so many more ideas for later in the story. Word wasn't acting up, either. Yay!

Went through the Measure unit for Chinese. They use different measure words for things like people, animals, food, drinks, etc. Also, they seem to not use digits like 1, 2, 3. Instead, they use the characters for those: 一 (yī), 二 (èr), 三 (sān). They use liang for 2 people instead of er. Kind of like we use 'couple' sometimes. It looks a bit weird with phone numbers just in those characters. Interesting, though. Next, it's the Money unit. I was ok with pronunciation this time. Had a few perfect sentences, and the rest were very close. They've added speaking back what you've heard without it written out. As well as answering a question with saying the correct choice given. A little more difficult, but seems like a good way to learn it, too. 

Yesterday I started reading the manga, Choujin Gakuen or Supernatural Academy. It's been interesting so far. I might go into it more next time. Read more of Helck today. Not much went on other than quite a bit of dialog. Asuta's fine, at least. She's still imprisoned. 

Managed to get to cleaning my bathroom today. Yay! Finished cleaning the toilet. Next will be the tub/shower area. 

I've kept up grooming Rosie with the mitt. Her lumps are all slowly coming to the surface. I clipped off one of the biggest clumps a couple of weeks ago with scissors, because it was so close to just falling off. Some of the others are getting to that point now. Her fur is so nice, soft, and shiny. It's really helped her, and I think she knows it. I think she thinks of it like some humans might think of going to the spa for a massage. She loves it and becomes very relaxed afterwards. I also inked Doina's head from Alliance. I'll edit the 3 newest heads in Photoshop and post them soon.

I've been keeping up with being strict with my calories and such. (Started going back to this Monday.) I've set my daily calorie range to 1200-1600. I'm trying to shoot for the middle of it (1400) most of the time. Of course, during the weekend I'll allow myself to eat as much as I want, since they're my treat days. It's interesting to figure this stuff out beforehand through MyFitnessPal. I still can have quite a decent amount of food throughout the day. I'm always surprised by how much I can eat of certain things this way. Like, the carrot cake slice I got recently is supposed to be a single serving. It's about 800 calories, though. So, I've been having a quarter of it each time. (4 servings for something that's supposed to be one...It just amazes me.) Down to the last one, and it might be a little stale. Many things are going to make more servings than what's listed, while eating this way. I'm doing slightly better with protein lately, too. Still trying to watch the other nutrients and keep it more balanced. I'm 'documenting' a lot of this on Instagram. I've done it before in the past. I keep thinking people will think it's annoying and stop following. I've found the opposite to be true. I've been getting a lot more likes and follows. I guess people like this sort of thing.